Indiana Fever rookie Caitlin Clark added one final accolade to finish up her record-breaking debut season in the WNBA.
Clark was named to the All-WNBA first team on Wednesday, making her the first rookie on the first team since Candace Parker when she was with the Los Angeles Sparks in 2008.
To no surprise, the Minnesota Lynx’s Napheesa Collier and Las Vegas Aces’ A’ja Wilson were both unanimous selections on the first team. The New York Liberty’s Breanna Stewart and Connecticut Sun’s Alyssa Thomas rounded out the honorees.
Wilson and Collier finished first and second, respectively, in the MVP voting, with Wilson receiving all 67 first-place votes. Collier bounced right back by winning Defensive Player of the Year by 10 votes over the Aces forward.
Both were no-brainers for the All-WNBA first team.
Wilson dominated, pacing the league in scoring (26.9) and blocks (2.6) and was also a monster on the boards, coming in second in rebounds (11.9). While the Aces three-peat bid attempt ended in the semifinals, the team would have won far fewer than 27 games and fallen out of the top four had it not been for the accomplishments of its best player.
Collier was the driving force in a major turnaround in the ‘Twin City’. The Lynx posted the second-best record (30-10) behind only the Liberty and were victorious winning the Commissioner’s Cup after dropping 21 games in 2023. Collier just barely missed averaging a double-double with 20.4 points and 9.7 rebounds, and her value was enhanced even more by her defensive tenacity and was reflected in part by her team having the second-best defensive rating (94.8).
Embed from Getty ImagesClark, meanwhile, put together one of the best rookie seasons in recent memory. She knew how to get her teammates involved, setting a record for total assists (337) while averaging 19.6 points and 8.6 assists. Her notable improvement in the second half helped elevate the Fever to a sixth-place finish and their first postseason trip since 2016.
Stewart could not maintain her MVP form from 2023 but still put up gaudy numbers, 20.4 points, 8.5 rebounds and 1.3 blocks per contest. The Liberty had the WNBA’s best record (32-8) and are battling it out tooth and nail with the Lynx in an epic WNBA Finals with the series at 2-1 in favor of New York.
Thomas did not have to carry the team on her shoulders this season compared to last year thanks to DiJonai Carrington’s breakthrough and the midseason acquisition of Marina Mabrey from the Chicago Sky. Still, nobody questioned her value as a two-way player as she dished out 7.9 assists and registered 1.6 steals per game.
